BLOG - Frederic C. Richhttps://fredericrich.com/blog/Tue, 27 Aug 2019 13:22:54 +0000en-USSite-Server v6.0.0-19924-19924 (http://www.squarespace.com)Thoughts on a variety of topics by Fred Rich, author of Getting to Green <br/> and Christian Nation. If you are looking for Fred&#39;s urban agriculture <br/>blog, visit batteryrooftopgarden.org. The Foundations of our ProsperityFrederic RichTue, 27 Aug 2019 13:37:13 +0000https://fredericrich.com/blog/2019/8/27/the-foundations-of-our-prosperity55a01411e4b0da93269f2e06:55de6692e4b0f73b86bffb96:5d652eaeb5366a00015ca2a0Many of us have focused on how Trump’s galumphing vandalism of our political culture threatens the foundations of our democracy. But what about our prosperity?

Like many others who rose from humble origins to the professional class, I enrolled in the GOP believing my interests were largely aligned with the party of business. My fellow Republicans appeared to share my beliefs that trade was the engine of wealth, that trade wars were always ruinous, that free flow of capital and labor was the bedrock of the market economy, that economic growth required stable monetary policy executed by an independent Federal Reserve, and that markets – and not the “orders” of politicians – should guide the choices made by business. I eventually left the GOP, both because of its embrace of the odious culture-war agenda of “movement conservatives” and because, with maturity, the public good, and not my own economic interests, became the main touchstone of my politics.

This morning I tried to imagine what would have happened, at any other point during the past six decades of my life, if a U.S. President, all on the same day, had “hereby ordered” every U.S. business to disengage from a key part of its overseas supply-chain and market, declared the Chair of the Federal Reserve to be a national “enemy,” and escalated a ruinous trade war with our country’s single largest trading partner. The GOP I knew would have swung into full crisis mode, sensing an unprecedented threat to the economy. The President would have been accused of acting illegally, trampling the private property and contract rights of business in a way that smacked of socialist autocracy, as well as ignoring the inviolable lessons of economic history.

Instead, what we hear from the GOP is silence. So has it really come to this? Is the intellectual and moral bankruptcy of the GOP so definitive that none of its leaders can rise to defend free markets, free trade, private property, and rule of law? Republicans have demonstrated they will do anything to obtain and maintain power. But what for, if not this?

My former party, having become nothing more than the vehicle for a populist demagogue, offers only the self-styled “Chosen One,” whose narcissistic whims and impulses are well on the way to undermining the laws, practices, institutions, and policies that are the foundations of our prosperity.

]]>LondonFrederic RichMon, 03 Jun 2019 13:58:35 +0000https://fredericrich.com/blog/2019/6/3/london55a01411e4b0da93269f2e06:55de6692e4b0f73b86bffb96:5cf5249dc9ba290001b37e39Every country’s politics function within the bounds of both written rules and a set of unwritten norms. Most often, the difference between democracy and authoritarianism, or between national greatness and a failed state, lies not with the quality of its written constitution, but with the quality of its political culture.

Among the catastrophes America has suffered under Trump is the systematic dismantling of a political culture built up over two centuries. A political culture doesn’t determine the legal rights and prerogatives enjoyed by public officials, but it sets normative limits on how those rights and prerogatives should be exercised, and expectations for behavior within the scope of their official functions. For example, our political culture developed norms to distinguish between the behavior of a president acting as Head of State, where he/she is entitled to our patriotic support as the representative of all Americans, and the behavior required by a head of government, functioning in the hurly-burly of day-to-day politics. Our political culture establishes norms such as the non-interference by the President in criminal investigations by the Department of Justice, notwithstanding that the department ultimately falls under his/her authority. It includes acknowledgement of the fundamental importance of an independent and unfettered press, no matter how annoying or even irresponsible an individual practitioner. It includes all sorts of standards arising out of separation of powers, including special respect for the independence of the judiciary. It establishes institutional government, where the authority of the President is exercised within the context of a vast executive branch in which policies are vetted and analyzed, most decisions are taken below the level of the Oval Office, and distilled high-quality advice is provided to the chief executive. It sets standards for behavior, including at least the veneer of respect, when politicians deal with each other in their official capacities. It includes the principle that “politics stop at the border” and many others.

It’s not news that Trump frequently violates virtually all of these norms, and indeed, harbors an instinctive hostility to any political culture that constrains his egocentric, impulsive, ill-informed, “I alone,” no-advice decision making style, or that requires him to recognize limits on executive power, distinguish between government and politics, or make policy based on anything other than the personal (Chairman Kim and I “like each other”) or transactional (everything, and that means everything, is a “deal”). What is news, I think, is that American government stripped of the political culture that made it the envy of the world, is the new normal. Its violation – or more precisely, its absence – no longer gets a mention by the mainstream press, or by ordinary Americans reviewing the day’s events around the water cooler.

Today the President, in his capacity as Head of State, is on a state visit to the United Kingdom, where he will meet the Queen as an equal. In a single pre-arrival tweet, he violated not only the norms of American political culture, but the norms of international diplomacy and universal standards of personal behavior, by calling the Muslim mayor of his host city a “stone cold loser,” adding “Kahn reminds me very much of our very dumb and incompetent Mayor of NYC, de Blasio, who has also done a terrible job” and then, descending to the inevitable school-yard taunt, added that Kahn is “only half his [de Blasio’s] height.”

But that’s not the terrifying thing. I listened to the reports on several of the major network radio news shows this morning, the sort of thing millions of Americans are listening to while driving to work. Trump’s words were reported as matter-of-factly as if he had tweeted something about his administration’s policy approach to the coming trade negotiations. There was not a word of surprise or context. Not even an inflection signaling that something out of the ordinary had occurred. And why? It hadn’t. It’s the new normal. (Here’s a thought experiment: picture Walter Cronkite telling the nation of JFK’s assassination and the moon landing. Now try to picture how he would have reported this morning’s tweet.)

Following this incident, the Queen should have refused to meet with Trump. We know she finds him abhorrent. The Prime Minister should publicly demand an apology for the gratuitous insult to London’s mayor. Congress, including Congressional Republicans, should censure the President for his conduct while representing America abroad as Head of State. John McCain spoke up following Trump’s appalling summit with Putin, calling it "one of the most disgraceful performances by an American president in memory." Does no GOP Senator wish to claim McCain’s mantle? Is the self-proclaimed party of patriotism and values really bereft of a single person willing to stand up for America and decency?

250,000 Britons, about the same number as took to the streets during his previous visit, are expected to demonstrate against Trump. On one hand, this is welcome and inspiring news. On the other, it is mortifying. Since the Women’s March, no group of Americans that large has assembled to protest Trump.

]]>Theocracy WatchFrederic RichMon, 01 Apr 2019 13:30:03 +0000https://fredericrich.com/blog/2019/4/1/theocracy-watch55a01411e4b0da93269f2e06:55de6692e4b0f73b86bffb96:5ca20e7c9b747a60a5e05b80So, let’s get this straight. It’s the fourth century BCE and the Persians control Jewish lands. The Persian King decides to have a beauty contest to choose a new wife, and a Jewish orphan named Esther is forced to enter the contest. The situation catches the attention of the Hebrew deity, who intervenes to assure that Esther wins. In the meantime, the Persian King appoints a notorious anti-Semite as chief minister, who offers the King 10,000 silver talents in return for the right to massacre the Jews, a deal to which the King agrees. You see how this relates to Trump? No? Keep reading.

Skipping some convoluted back and forth, Esther proves to be the right person in the right place at the right time, managing not only to convince the King to lift the edict calling for elimination of the Jewish people, but getting permission to kill the evil anti-Semitic minister, his 10 sons, and 75,000 other enemies of the Jewish people. This massacre is celebrated as “Purim.”

Still don’t get it? God sent Esther to deliver the Jewish people from their Persian adversaries, and must have figured that the time was right for a repeat, so he sent us (and right at Purim, no less) Donald Trump to again deliver the Jews from the Persians (contemporary Iran). Yep, Mike Pompeo thinks Donald Trump is the modern Esther. “As a Christian, I certainly believe that’s possible,” says the U.S. Secretary of State. And then, more robustly, “I am confident that the Lord is at work here,” Pompeo concluded.

In case it’s not all clear how this fits together, Trump’s rabidly pro-Israel evangelical supporters believe that all Jews will spend eternity in conscious torment in hell (because they have not accepted Jesus Christ as their savior). Conservative Israelis are prepared to overlook this in return for evangelical support for their agenda. Evangelicals are willing to overlook this because they need the Israelis to maintain their occupation of Jerusalem (and to rebuild the Temple), which are conditions to the “rapture” (the time when the evangelicals go to heaven and the Jews – and everyone else not “born again” – are left behind and destined, in due course, for hell). Talk about a marriage of convenience.

If you indulge in the illusion that America’s largest religious block may turn its back on the only totally amoral President in history, don’t. Evangelical leaders argue that God’s prophets and agents are often flawed, and this one – by recognizing Jerusalem as the capital of Israel, abandoning the Palestinians, and now endorsing the illegal annexation of the Golan Heights – has done more than anyone else to advance the rapture, the most important thing that can or will ever happen. Trump will be rewarded for this by an outpouring of evangelical support.

It’s 2019, the age of quantum computing and genetic editing, and the next election in the world’s most “advanced” country may be determined by fundamentalist interpretations of an ancient eschatological myth. If this doesn’t terrify and anger you, wake up.

]]>"A decent respect to the opinions of mankind . . ."Frederic RichFri, 22 Mar 2019 04:00:30 +0000https://fredericrich.com/blog/2019/3/22/a-decent-respect-to-the-opinions-of-mankind-55a01411e4b0da93269f2e06:55de6692e4b0f73b86bffb96:5c945ba4e4966bad922feb79Your correspondent is reporting from Abu Dhabi. While traveling during the past month I have been seeing the situation in America more or less exclusively through the lens of the media in South Asia and the Middle East. I’ve been making notes and thought you would be interested in the view from the outside.

Seen from this part of the world, the great global threat is an energized far-right nativist and nationalist movement led by opportunistic thugs. Duarte, Putin, Erdogan, and Trump are spoken of in the same breath. Every day’s news – most recently Trump’s tortured response to the mosque massacre in New Zealand ­– seems to confirm this view. The rising generation on this planet has never known the America of E pluribus unum, the America of “Give me your tired, your poor, Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,” the America that liberated the world from fascism. They know only the America of white grievance and corporatist greed – an America standing absurdly on the wrong side of demography and history.

The coverage of the 737-Max debacle has been illuminating. The near universal deference once accorded to U.S. government institutions such as the FAA is gone. In its place, a belief that under America’s corporatist politics the financial interests of Boeing would trump public safety, and the view that Trump has either politicized or dismantled the U.S. government institutions previously respected by the world. Papers yesterday noted with approval that Canadian and EU regulators would not rely on the FAA to validate the fixes to the 737-Max software. Indeed, the media here has been dismissive of the American government’s role, noting that Trump had left the FAA Chairmanship vacant for a year, and then considered his personal pilot for the post.

Guns are one area where the rest of the world has long been baffled by America’s seeming collective insanity. But there is an emerging view here that the gun control debate in America is about power, not culture. A statement in Trump’s March interview with Breitbart was widely noted: "I can tell you I have the support of the police, the support of the military, the support of the Bikers for Trump -- I have the tough people, but they don't play it tough -- until they go to a certain point, and then it would be very bad, very bad." And what is that “certain point”? The elections, of course, if Trump loses. As one Indian commentator observed, the right has all the guns. Why would they give up power?

Hypocrisy is a major theme of the coverage of contemporary America – which, the argument goes, supports values such as rule of law and free trade when they are applied to others, but ignores them as constraints on its own actions. It is not easy to be a Gulf state partnering with America in the fight against Islamist radicals on a day when the U.S. Secretary of State appears with Netanyahu in districts key to the coming Israeli elections, and Trump Tweets away decades of bipartisan U.S. policy (not to mention U.S. leverage) by recognizing the illegal annexation of the Golan Heights. The winners, according to the press here: Iran, Hezbollah, and Putin (so much for Crimea).

Americans have thick skins. Culturally, we are comfortable standing alone in the world, adhering to our view of right and wrong, even when prevailing sentiment is against us. But Americans do not like being the butt of jokes and the subject of ridicule. So if you travel, steel yourself. Our President is viewed as preposterous. America is the new Absurdistan.

]]>The Pilot Who Cannot FlyFrederic RichWed, 20 Feb 2019 15:29:16 +0000https://fredericrich.com/blog/2019/2/20/the-pilot-who-cannot-fly55a01411e4b0da93269f2e06:55de6692e4b0f73b86bffb96:5c6d6f259140b752b96bda15You are a passenger on a plane. A large number of things have gone wrong. The plane is buffeted by head winds. The flight radar is down. The airline’s system for scheduling flight crews was hacked by one of its competitors. The pilot in the cockpit doesn’t know how to fly. For the moment, the autopilot is still engaged and the plane is flying normally.

From the point of view of the passenger, which of these problems is the most serious?

Most of us would say that the most urgent problem is that the person sitting in the Captain’s chair lacks the ability to fly. The autopilot may be engaged, but we know that at any moment we could face a challenge where only the diligence and competence of the pilot stands between us and disaster.

And yet in the analogous situation here on the ground, we suffer from a collective blindness to our most acute risk. Take the following example. It is July 2017. The collective conclusion of the U.S. intelligence agencies is that North Korea had test-fired an Intercontinental Ballistic Missile. We now know that the President refused to believe this intelligence, dismissing it as a “hoax” because Russian President Vladimir Putin told him North Korea lacked that capacity.

What is revealed by this breathtaking anecdote? What about it should concern us most? For most of the press and commentariat, the main issue was the malign influence of our prime adversary’s leader over our President, and perhaps further evidence of “collusion.”

In my opinion, this misses the point. The issue isn’t Russia. The issue is that the pilot cannot fly. Our present safety is an autopilot illusion.

· The President is functionally disabled. He lacks the ordinary ability to absorb and process information, what psychologists call “executive function.” Executive function requires the ability to pay attention, gather information and structure it for evaluation, focus and remember details, and make decisions based on available information. We now have testimony from dozens of former White House insiders about how this disability is manifest: he lacks interest in many of the problems and decisions presented to the President. He will not read, sit through briefings, or absorb facts relevant to decisions.

· Instead, to navigate the world and make decisions, Trump depends on a completely different modus operandi. A problem is interesting only if it involves him personally. The world is divided into friends and enemies. Friends are those who flatter him and appear for the moment to buy into his narcissistic narrative of greatness; enemies are everyone else. Information is credible if it comes from friends and advances his narcissistic narrative (does it make me look like a winner?). Information is not credible (to be dismissed as “fake” or a “hoax”) if it does not. Understanding Trump really is that simple.

· It is possible to be an effective politician without executive function. After all, in politics you win or lose; slogans and messages are based on emotion and content matters little. Someone passionately convinced of his own greatness will “sell” that illusion more effectively than a non-narcissist.

· Governing is another thing altogether. Substance does matter. A President cannot navigate the complexities of national security without engaging with the facts and making some analysis – or, as an alternative, seeking the advice and taking the counsel of those who do. But Trumpian populism is deeply suspicious of expertise and authority. The narcissist is convinced he can fly the plane alone, despite lacking any of the skills of a pilot.

· So imagine that day in July when the intelligence services presented their analysis on the North Korean missile threat. On one hand, we have the collective analysis of thousands of independent non-partisan experts and professionals. It is presented in writing. It is evidence-based. It is complex and nuanced. It isn’t about him. In the past, the intelligence services have refused to tell him what he wanted to hear. On the other hand, we have Putin, an A-list celebrity who has flattered him shamelessly, whose strongman rule he admires, and who probably was instrumental in his election. Putin told him, mano a mano, that North Korea lacked the capacity to develop ICBMs. It was the answer he wanted to hear. It should surprise no one which of the two sources Trump would rely on.

It doesn’t matter how much you hate government or wish it would shrink. The world is a dangerous place. The man his secretary of state called “a moron” might be able to do the job if he surrounded himself with first class advisors and took their advice. He doesn’t. Integrity and competence are causes for firing in the Trump White House. The republic is in no less peril than our plane with a pilot who doesn’t know how to fly.

Contemporary fundamentalist conservatism has been built on a foundation of Orwellian inversions (e.g, Fox News as “fair and balanced”). But before Trump, I believed that conservatives who called themselves “patriots” were sincere in their professions of “country first.” Not anymore. Most Republicans have thrown national security under the bus in the pursuit of power. John McCain called them out before he died, but they didn’t listen. Our enemies are circling. We see storms on the horizon in every direction, and yet the GOP fights to keep the man who cannot fly in the pilot’s seat. When the plane crashes, historians will know where the blame lies.

]]>Institutional GovernmentFrederic RichSun, 23 Dec 2018 13:06:16 +0000https://fredericrich.com/blog/2018/12/23/institutional-government55a01411e4b0da93269f2e06:55de6692e4b0f73b86bffb96:5c1f85f7aa4a99bcaeb2fd6cIn less politically correct times we used to refer derisively to “banana republics.” Originally applied narrowly to a certain type of Central American country overly dependent on fruit exports, the term later was used more broadly to refer to countries that nominally take the form of constitutional democracies, but that lack the institutions and political cultures to sustain them. As a result, they typically are run by autocratically-inclined rulers elected by populist forces motivated by empty talk of national greatness. They maintain legislatures and courts, but these are not effective in reining in the impulses of the caudillo. The most powerful families and companies live in symbiosis with the autocrat (who they despise), dispensing flattery and political support in return for protection of their interests.

This type of politics is a tragedy for the citizens of these unhappy countries, but – because the “banana republic” countries usually matter so little – they became fodder for jokes, parodies, and satirical novels. The United States is not a banana republic, but in some respects, it has started to behave like one. Unlike Honduras and its ilk, America matters a great deal, and as a consequence, the world is not laughing.

The critical distinction between a mature nation-state (whether a democracy or not) and a banana republic is institutional government. In a mature state, the political and governmental institutions are strong and high functioning. The political process for decision making may be messy, but once decisions are made they can be communicated and relied on as the position of the government. National policies and priorities have broad continuity over time, regardless of changes in political control. Institutional government is like a supertanker – newly elected politicians may push the rudder hard to port or starboard, but the ship turns slowly. Standing bureaucracies assure that politicians, holding temporary power only, make decisions armed with the best information and analysis arising from a sprawling government. This stability and coherence is what allows a country with strong institutions to lead.

Events of the past two weeks illustrate the extent to which our long tradition of institutional government has been abandoned. On Thursday our special representative in charge of the talks for Afghan reconciliation stated that the United States was committed to the fight in Afghanistan: “the United States will stand with the government and the people of Afghanistan.” On Friday morning, Trump, without informing our Afghan allies in advance, announced the drawdown of our troops.

With respect to Syria, the National Security Advisor said “we’re not going to leave” and the Department of Defense reassured our allies that we are “continuing operations” and “remain committed.” A few days later Trump announced by tweet that the U.S. was withdrawing its troops from Syria. Congress, the State Department, and the Pentagon all are reported to have been “blindsided.” The Secretary of Defense resigned, still smarting at not having been informed before his impulsive boss announced our cancellation of the Iranian nuclear deal, suspension of joint military exercises with South Korea, or creation of a sixth branch (the “Space Force”) of the U.S. military.

Banana republic: impulsive rule by a single autocrat. Lack of institutional deliberation and process.

Michael Lewis’s meticulous reporting in Fifth Risk reveals that the executive branch of the federal government is led by a man with no knowledge of, interest in, or need for, the institution which he leads. Even Steve Bannon, proponent of the “deconstruction of the administration state,” said of Trump’s attitude toward the government he is supposed to be running: “Holy fuck, this guy doesn’t know anything. And he doesn’t give a shit.”

Lewis details the President’s failure to fill vacancies, to appoint persons with relevant skills or experience, or to set policy agendas at the department or agency level. Lewis’s reporting makes clear that while this approach to governing results in large part from not “giv[ing] a shit,” another part results from deliberate vandalism. Trump wants the institutions of government to get out of his way. When he does make appointments, the most relevant credential (other than personal loyalty to Trump) appears to be a declared dedication to dismantling or undermining the missions of the agencies they would serve.

The American right, as a political strategy, has long stoked anger against the Federal government. GOP candidates competed to list all the departments and agencies they would eliminate. We’ll get rid of the IRS, the EPA, the Departments of Energy, Education, and Commerce. It was all good fun, “playing to the base.” No one took it seriously. But now it has happened. We still have these departments and agencies, but they have been gutted and neutered. Donald’s dream has come true: there is only Trump.

The President swears to defend the constitution and to “faithfully execute the Office of President of the United States.” This includes, as the particular duty of the President, to ensure the staffing, management, and effective functioning of the executive branch. The institutions of the executive branch are mostly established by law. Their missions and functions are not optional.

No one reading Fifth Risk could conclude that Trump has “faithfully executed” his office. Most GOP congressmen know he hasn’t and also know they have a constitutional duty to do something about it. Republican businessmen and financiers, who held their noses and accepted the farcical con-man in return for tax breaks and regulatory reform, now know they put the republic in peril.

Banana republic: the political and commercial establishment lives in symbiosis with the autocrat (who they despise), dispensing flattery and political support in return for favors and commercial opportunity.

On one of the screens, talking heads discuss Bush 41, all agreeing that he was modest, selfless, empathetic, smart, experienced, prudent, a steady and wise leader, a model husband, a true patriot, etc. Trump becomes agitated and picks up the phone.

Trump: Get me Hannity.

Hannity: Good morning, Mr. President.

Trump: Tell the guys to go light on this Bush funeral thing. You know, it makes Trump look bad.

Hannity: Yes sir. [he pauses] But exactly how . . .

Trump: You know, just tell them it’s fake news.

Hannity: I’m sorry, Mr. President, you want us to tell them that Bush didn’t really die?

Trump: Nah. Just play up the wimp thing, tell ‘em that if he had been more like Trump he wouldn’t have been such a loser. He was a terrible deal-maker. Tell ‘em that.

Trump hangs up. He burps loudly and rubs his belly, regretting the three Big Macs he had the Secret Service fetch as a pre-bed snack. He feels slightly woozy.

His attention is seized by one of the screens, where the Fox anchor has just said, “Mr. President.” He turns. The anchor is silent, staring straight at him. Trump closes his eyes and reopens them. The anchor leans forward.

Anchor: Donald, I’m talking to you.

Trump: What the fuck?

Anchor: I am the ghost of Christmas yet to come.

Trump: This must be a dream.

Anchor: No dream, Donald. This whole Bush 41 funeral thing must be terrible for you. I mean, it’s all about someone else. And, let’s face it, the comparison is not flattering.

Trump: Yea, it sucks. Worse than McCain. At least I didn’t have to go to that funeral.

Anchor: You ever think about your own funeral, Donald?

Trump: What? Nah, Trump’s gonna live longer than anyone ever.

Anchor: But the day will come. In fact, you’ll also die a few days before Christmas. Want to see?

Trump: Wake up. I want to wake up.

Anchor: Look over there.

The anchor points to the adjacent screen. Three talking heads sit around a table.

Trump: I’m not watching this.

He tries to close his eyes, but cannot.

Talking Head #1: So can we all agree that, just as there was never another President like Trump, there’s never been a Presidential death like Trump’s? How will the nation deal with it?

Talking Head #2: I think it’s the end of a tragic chapter in American life. After all, he was the first President elected due to the machinations of a foreign enemy. The first President suffering from personality disorders that made him a pathological liar and crippled his ability to take advice or make fact-based decisions. The first President who was the subject of ridicule and derision by every foreign leader he dealt with. A man who destroyed the political party that nominated him. The largest election loss by any incumbent President in history. The only President convicted of multiple felonies arising from his business activities and confined to a Federal penitentiary two years after leaving the White House.

Talking Head #3, interrupting: Remember, one of the convictions was under the RICO statute, establishing that the Trump Organization was a criminal enterprise.

Talking Head #1: Fraud, tax fraud, tax evasion, accounting fraud, larceny, extortion, bribery – I can’t even remember the list. Remember the interview where he said that running for President was the worst . . .

Talking Head #3, interrupting, laughing: I seem to recall he said “only” . . .

Talking Head #1, laughing: Right. . . .“only” mistake he ever made. He thought if he hadn’t been President, they never would have discovered the rest. He said he would have lived out his life at Mar-a-Lago playing golf.

Talking Head #2: You know, one of the most remarkable things in retrospect was the lack of loyalty. Every President leaves the White House with a group of loyalists who spend the rest of their lives defending his reputation and trying to build his legacy. Can anyone think of a single member of the administration who defended him?

Talking Head #3: Just the opposite. They raced to write books, each filled with the lurid details of life in the West Wing. He was incapable of loyalty to others, so of course in the end no one was loyal to him.

Talking Head #1: Even Melania. Her book received the largest advance ever.

Trump: Enough. Fake news, all of it.

Anchor, sounding gruff and pointing at the adjacent screen: It’s not enough. Look.

On the screen, a cemetery in Queens. A casket is lowered into the ground. Three of his five children are the only persons present. They stand in a group, looking bored.

Voice over: It is a most extraordinary sight, unprecedented in American history. Congress voted overwhelmingly to deny the ex-President a state funeral. Congressman Menendez, minority leader for the New Republicans, said, “Where there was no honor, there shall be paid no honor.”

Trump throws his water glass at the second screen, breaking it. He turns back and addresses the Anchor.

Trump: This vision of Christmas to come, is it the only possible future, or can I change it?

Anchor: The message of Christmas is that we all have a shot at redemption. Even you, Donald.

]]>The Morning AfterFrederic RichWed, 07 Nov 2018 20:29:32 +0000https://fredericrich.com/blog/2018/11/7/the-morning-after55a01411e4b0da93269f2e06:55de6692e4b0f73b86bffb96:5be34883aa4a99366bd61659Most of us woke up this morning with two questions on our minds: what does it mean, and what do I do now? In the next 24 hours you will be bombarded by talking points and spin. Trump has already offered a typical Orwellian inversion: the midterm election in which his party lost the House was a “big success” and a “tremendous victory” and he has received “so many congratulations” from “foreign nations.” Moreover, he argues, Republicans lost only if they distanced themselves from Trump. On the other side, talking heads suggest hopefully that a Democratic House will stop Trump in his tracks. May I suggest that you silently resolve to keep an open mind for at least a week or two? There are numbers to be crunched and analysis that needs to be done. The situation, as usual, is more complicated.

While I don’t yet have a coherent big-picture “take” on the results, I will share some thoughts.

· First, don’t be discouraged. Many ordinary people made extraordinary expenditures of money, time, and energy to influence the results, and hoped for more. Don’t underestimate or undervalue what you’ve achieved. The Trump Party has been denied the power to legislate. Many of us feared that a decade of gerrymandering combined with relentless voter suppression would make it impossible to take back the House. It was your time, money and votes that proved this wrong.

· I watched with astonishment last night as Texas came close to electing a progressive Democrat to the Senate. The seas of blue spreading from that state’s urban centers may soon offset the extreme conservatism of rural Texas. This is encouraging. The times they are a-changin’.

· In the long run, much will depend on which party controls swing state legislatures and governorships during the redistricting that will follow the 2020 census. That will be determined in 2020, but last night’s results, when fully in and analyzed, should give a clue.

· The obvious benefits of denying the Trump Party control of the House are somewhat offset by its extraordinary utility to the President as an excuse. In 2020, everything good will be his and his alone; everything bad will be the fault of the obstructionist dems. This will resonate strongly with his base and provide the necessary exculpation for, e.g., the absence of a wall paid for by Mexico.

· With the remarkable sight of a Fox “journalist” campaigning on stage with the President (not to mention the revolving door between the network and the government, and the daily collaboration between their respective leaders), the illusion that Fox News is simply a commercial news platform with an ideological bias has been fully and finally shattered. Perhaps the single most salient fact of American political life at this moment is that most Americans get their news from a government-coordinated media outlet that, hour by hour, promotes the latest “alternative-fact” or spin from the White House. When it started, Fox was simply an instrumentality of a rebellious movement conservatism. But now that movement (as high-jacked by its ugly alt-right step-child) has moved into power, and so this long-standing alliance has become something very different. I repeat, the majority of Americans – like the residents of authoritarian states everywhere ­– receive only government propaganda as their “news.” Why my libertarian friends are not horrified by this is something I do not understand.

Before last night’s election I wrote that the only question on the ballot was whether or not you approve of Trump. I was wrong. For well over half of Americans, the only question on the ballot yesterday was “Who am I?”

For a significant plurality of Americans, politics is now a team sport. Why do you support your team? You support the Mets “Because I’m a Mets fan.” You don’t switch to the Yankees when the Mets have a bum for a coach. The pre-election mobilization against the “invasion” was called “Operation Faithful Patriot.” This effectively reminded Trump Party voters who they are. They are faithful. They are patriots. When they enter the election booth, they are, in essence, being asked only to reaffirm or deny that identity. The 35% who “strongly approve” (the scary rally-attending core base) actually think he’s a great American doing a great job. The additional 12% who voted yesterday for Trump Party House candidates may realize that he’s a vulgar lying moron, but that doesn’t matter: he’s their vulgar lying moron. Voting for the other side is just not who they are.

I, perhaps like you, awoke on Tuesday silently indulging the hope that it might be the day we awoke from a nightmare. My dream was that many of the good people who – for whatever reason – voted for Tump in 2016, would send some kind of a signal that they didn’t much like what they saw – the bragging, bullying, lying, vulgarity, misogyny, racism, ignorance, amorality, and violence. It didn’t happen. So now we know our problem will not disappear overnight. But the journey to bring this country back from the brink has begun.

]]>FearFrederic RichTue, 30 Oct 2018 15:40:42 +0000https://fredericrich.com/blog/2018/10/30/fear55a01411e4b0da93269f2e06:55de6692e4b0f73b86bffb96:5bd8781ee4966b393ef0a7fbI read both the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal most mornings. I usually rise from the couch feeling some combination of incredulity, anger, and despair. This morning, for the first time, I felt a sharp stab of fear.

A shrinking gaggle of mostly Honduran refugees is slowly making its way north, still weeks away from the border. In response, Trump has launched the largest quick deployment of active-duty U.S. military since 2010 by ordering over 5000 troops to counter what the President called “an invasion of our country.” He calls it “Operation Faithful Patriot.” “[Democrats],” he says, “want to open America’s borders and turn our country into a friendly sanctuary for murderous thugs from other countries who will kill us all.” And are the American people buying it? On the front page, the Times quotes a graphic designer from Illinois: “I feel like we’re fighting for our freedom when it comes to our borders. [The caravan will] destroy America, and . . . bring us to our knees. I’m not going to take it – not going to go down without a fight.”

For tens of millions of our fellow citizens, this is the reality they will bring with them to the voting booth next Tuesday, not the actual reality that individuals steeped in the rhetoric of the Trump base sent pipe bombs to most of the leadership of the opposition party, and did murder 11 worshiping Jews for no reason other than their religion. I fear that democracy cannot function in a society without the grounding reference point of a common reality, no less a shared culture or shared narrative of nationhood and history. Who wins in what Chris Hedges calls “the empire of illusion”? I fear the answer is the party that is comfortable peddling a manipulative narrative untethered from the truth and highly skilled at manipulating the levers of social and other media; the party that is willing to open Pandora’s box and unleash the powerful passions of hate, resentment, nativism, and prejudice.

Reading on, I find that Brazil, by far the largest country in Latin America, elected as its president a far-right politician who said “Let’s go straight to the dictatorship,” as the only way to fix a broken country. He told a magazine that he’d “rather his son die in a car accident” than be gay, and told a female politician on camera that she was not good enough to be raped. Sound familiar? So Brazil joins Italy, Hungary, Poland, Russia, and Austria. I fear that we still view these elections as aberrant and fail to recognize that we are in the midst of a global epidemic. Why are the champions of liberal democracy not fighting these outbreaks with the same vigor we brought to Ebola, SARS and other threatening pathogens?

When Trump was elected, I wrote that “cancellation of trade deals will send the global economy into a tailspin and devastate American business and workers.” Instead, the long tail of our recovery from the 2008 recession drove the economy forward, and the stock market, artificially buoyed by a large corporate tax cut, floated ever upward. This morning something changed. The Wall Street Journal has previously opposed Trump’s multi-front trade war, but only in a pro forma way. This morning, the paper chose to run an opinion piece with a stark verdict: “That crashing sound you heard in the world markets last week wasn’t just a correction. It was the sound of the end of an age.” The end of an age when Washington emphasized “opening of markets and reducing barriers to investment and trade” and “the positive-sum logic of economics trumped zero-sum international politics.” In its place, a far-right rage that seeks to destroy globalism and the Trumpist world view that international relations is a zero-sum contest between winners and losers. As an investor, I have learned over a long period to ignore the ups and downs of the market. But reading this, I felt an emotion toxic to markets: fear.

And finally, finished with both papers, I was struck by what was missing. Where were the voices of the opposition? Consider this: Both papers reported the deployment of Federal troops to the border together with the President’s explanation that we were being “invaded.” And who provided the counterpoint? Who called Trump out for this abuse of Federal power for transparently partisan purposes? Speaker Pelosi? Leader Schumer? Neither the Times nor the Journal quoted a single Democratic politician in opposition. (Ex-military leaders, however, were quick to react, and succinct: “This is using the troops as props,” said an ex-Army infantry officer.) I fear that no resistance can succeed without effective leaders. I fear that the political establishment (or what remains of it) is not going to come to our rescue. I fear that it really is up to each of us as individuals and the decisions we make next Tuesday.

Fear can be either enervating or energizing. We can be paralyzed by fear or it can spur action that saves our lives. I can only hope that I’m not the only one who has felt an escalation of fear in recent days. If enough of those millennials, minorities, suburban women, centrists, moderates, and independents feel the same way, we might finally get some good news on Tuesday night.

]]>Which side are you on?Frederic RichThu, 25 Oct 2018 23:03:33 +0000https://fredericrich.com/blog/2018/10/25/which-side-are-you-on55a01411e4b0da93269f2e06:55de6692e4b0f73b86bffb96:5bd249e215fcc0be2fb53b39When you vote on November 6, don’t be fooled into thinking that this election is about the candidates whose names are printed on the ballot. There will be only one headline on November 7. The nation will either embrace or repudiate Trumpism. You are being asked only a single question: “Which side are you on?”

The choices are no longer Republican or Democrat, conservative or liberal. The GOP we once knew, defined by ideology and policy, no longer exists. Now there is only Trump and anti-Trump.

The choice is between an ethnic nationalism hunkered down behind a wall, and an open society that values pluralism and diversity. It is the choice between a moral vacuum in which the ends justify the means, and a political culture in which we demand honesty and decency from our leaders. It is the choice between ignorance and learning, bombastic bullying and respectful dialog, all-consuming ego and empathetic compassion, a narrative of hate and a narrative of hope.

Republican primary voters already have made their choice. All but a handful of Republicans in Congress already have made their choice. So now it’s up to you.

If you stayed home in 2016, disaffected by politics in general or Hillary in particular, you in effect voted for Trump. Now is the chance to atone. This time there are no excuses.

Max Boot, life-long GOP partisan and former editor of the Wall Street Journal op-ed page, argues in his new book that Americans must “vote against all Republicans.” For many of us, this requires realigning our very sense of self. I have always defined myself as a non-partisan rationalist, voting for person and policy, not party. Not this time. There will not be a single vote on my ballot under the GOP column.

In my September 2016 blog, What is fascism?, I examined each of the core markers of fascism (nationalism, resentment of “others,” fetishization of strength and power, contempt for the rule of law, aggression, disdain for the truth, and rejection of political convention). I concluded, “As hard as it is to swallow, there can be no denying that by these six measures, Trumpism is a proto-fascist movement ('proto' in this case meaning rising, or precursor to).” Even those who accepted my analysis believed, as I did, that – in the unlikely event of his victory – the strength of America’s political culture and institutions would prevent Trump from implementing his proto-fascist agenda.

Most turning points in history are visible only in retrospect. All too often we lack the perspective to see what is happening until it's too late. I have tried to adopt the perspective of a future historian asking the question whether by 2018 the Trumpist political movement had crossed the line from proto-fascist rhetoric to actual fascism. I believe our future historian would conclude that it had. Here’s why:

The GOP Is Now a Cult of Personality. Our governing political party is no longer defined by an ideological or policy agenda, but primarily by loyalty to Trump. Almost 60% of registered Republicans now tell pollsters they consider themselves "more a supporter of Trump than of the Republican Party." This is why virtually all of the GOP has stood silently as the President has reversed its long-standing commitments to, among other things, reduction of federal deficits, free trade, and our NATO alliance. Those Republicans not unswervingly loyal to Trump are retiring from political life, and those who don’t will be defeated by well-funded Trumpists in GOP primaries. Wall Street Journal and Fox News commentator Daniel Henninger now refers to “the Trump Party, formerly known as the GOP.” And Mr. Trump himself dismisses any remaining GOP critics, including most notably the Koch brothers, as not being “real Republicans.” Most disturbingly, 91% of strong Trump supporters say they trust Trump – more than any other source – for “accurate information,” notwithstanding his astonishing record of mendacity and his own express admission that he uses the “fake news” label to discredit anything critical or inconvenient to himself.

“O'Brien held up his left hand, its back towards Winston, with the thumb hidden and the four fingers extended. 'How many fingers am I holding up, Winston? And if the party says that it is not four but five -- then how many?'” (George Orwell, 1984, Part 3, Chapter 2.)

When nearly a third of Americans are now in a mind-set where they routinely answer “five fingers,” we have to admit that we are in the grip of a fascist movement.

The Foreign Policy of the USA Is One of Extreme Nationalism and Nativism. Nationalist and nativist policies can no longer be dismissed as populist rhetoric. The cowardly Congress of the United States has stood by as the State Department and other institutional stewards of America’s diplomatic values and traditions have been gutted or ignored, allowing the foreign policy of the United States to be defined by the angry whims of one man and conducted mano a mano with the thugs and tyrants that our President finds most congenial. The President has attacked our core alliances, celebrated and embraced fellow-authoritarians, launched trade wars against our allies, and unilaterally implemented immigration policies that have demolished our country’s reputation and standing in the world. Travel anywhere outside of the US and you'll be reminded of an incontestable truth: these are not Tump's positions and actions anymore, they are ours. America now has a fascist foreign policy.

The Executive Branch Attacks the Rule of Law and Press Freedom. The President launches personal attacks against judges whose decisions he does not like. At his behest, millions of Americans no longer trust the integrity of law enforcement or the courts. He illegally instructed his recused attorney general to terminate the Russia probe following months of relentless attacks on his own Justice Department. The President has doubled-down on his “enemy of the people” attacks on the free press, which are now escalating and will climax this fall. In September 2016 these things were the ravings of a populist candidate who few took seriously. But for the past year and a half they have been the acts and words of the President. Instead of a virus attacking the system from the outside, the virus now sits within – at the very core of our body politic – and has already started to cripple the institutions at the core of our democracy.

The Rise of Violence. Most disturbingly, the final line – the toleration and use of violent means – has been crossed. Trump the candidate encouraged his supporters to beat-up protesters at his rallies, and now as President he countenances the threat of violence against the news media. Mainstream media companies now need to engage security guards for their reporters covering Trump rallies. The White House approvingly tweets videos of crowds threatening the press and declines to criticize their menacing behavior. In response, left-wing extremists also have menaced Trumpies. The depth and bitterness of our political divide, engineered and celebrated by Trump and Bannon, is having exactly the effect they intended: the morphing of our politics in the direction of violent conflict. I predict that the 2018 mid-term campaign will be characterized by steadily escalating political violence.

* * *

Trump’s approval ratings stand at 40%, including 84% of Republicans. 34% of all voters strongly approve. History teaches that in Trump’s unshakable 34% of Americans we have a political base sufficient to support and sustain a fascist populist regime. Unless, that is, the rest of us turn out to vote and are unified in our opposition. History might well show that the 2018 midterms were the last moment when Trumpist fascism could have been derailed.

Fascism is a heavy charge, which many will dismiss as alarmist. But for those uncomfortable with drawing parallels to the 20th century, please consider what our future historian will see, looking back at 2018: fascist or near-fascist regimes in countries as diverse as North Korea, Venezuela, Russia, Turkey, Hungary, the Philippines, Turkmenistan and elsewhere. America is not alone in its struggle with this scourge. And remember that political science and history teach that fascism comes in many flavors, but all are ultra-nationalist, all are designed to restore lost national “greatness,” all admire the strong-man in politics and are based on loyalty to a strong-man ruler, and all are fundamentally hostile to the rights of minorities, rule of law and pluralist democracy. In addition to their fundamental political character, historians recognize fascist regimes by a certain style and rhetoric: large theatrical rallies, repetitive chants, extreme and provocative speech, and the toleration or promotion of violence in political life. We have been warned. We’ll find out on November 6, 2018, how many of us listened.

]]>Profile in CourageFrederic RichThu, 19 Jul 2018 02:22:03 +0000https://fredericrich.com/blog/2018/7/18/profile-in-courage55a01411e4b0da93269f2e06:55de6692e4b0f73b86bffb96:5b4ff4a770a6ad94de396461A large number of Republicans know that it is their patriotic duty to put the interests of country before the interests of party, but sadly have lacked the courage to do so. Two days ago John McCain reminded them what political courage looks like. I believe that everyone should read the full text of what Senator McCain wrote. Here it is, complete and unedited:

“Today’s press conference in Helsinki was one of the most disgraceful performances by an American president in memory. The damage inflicted by President Trump’s naiveté, egotism, false equivalence, and sympathy for autocrats is difficult to calculate. But it is clear that the summit in Helsinki was a tragic mistake.

“President Trump proved not only unable, but unwilling to stand up to Putin. He and Putin seemed to be speaking from the same script as the president made a conscious choice to defend a tyrant against the fair questions of a free press, and to grant Putin an uncontested platform to spew propaganda and lies to the world.

“It is tempting to describe the press conference as a pathetic rout – as an illustration of the perils of under-preparation and inexperience. But these were not the errant tweets of a novice politician. These were the deliberate choices of a president who seems determined to realize his delusions of a warm relationship with Putin’s regime without any regard for the true nature of his rule, his violent disregard for the sovereignty of his neighbors, his complicity in the slaughter of the Syrian people, his violation of international treaties, and his assault on democratic institutions throughout the world.

“Coming close on the heels of President Trump’s bombastic and erratic conduct towards our closest friends and allies in Brussels and Britain, today’s press conference marks a recent low point in the history of the American Presidency. That the president was attended in Helsinki by a team of competent and patriotic advisors makes his blunders and capitulations all the more painful and inexplicable.

“No prior president has ever abased himself more abjectly before a tyrant. Not only did President Trump fail to speak the truth about an adversary; but speaking for America to the world, our president failed to defend all that makes us who we are—a republic of free people dedicated to the cause of liberty at home and abroad. American presidents must be the champions of that cause if it is to succeed. Americans are waiting and hoping for President Trump to embrace that sacred responsibility. One can only hope they are not waiting totally in vain.

U.S. Senator John McCain (R-AZ), Chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee.”

]]>It's Worse Than You Can ImagineFrederic RichWed, 07 Feb 2018 12:51:31 +0000https://fredericrich.com/blog/2018/2/7/its-worse-than-you-can-imagine55a01411e4b0da93269f2e06:55de6692e4b0f73b86bffb96:5a7af128e2c483ccb4129f6cI have just finished reading Fire and Fury. I confess to opening the Amazon package with a certain salacious eagerness. In the upside-down world of the Trump Presidency, many of us have become almost addicted to the daily fix of bizarreness that reinforces our conviction that he is uniquely unfit for the job. Fire and Fury will cure you of this tendency. It will give you no pleasure.

For those who haven’t yet read the book, let me share a few of the things that caught my eye:

1. “Dope.” (General McMaster) “Dumb as shit.” (Gary Cohn) “A moron.” (Tillerson) “Idiot.” (Reince Priebus and Steve Mnuchin) “A fucking idiot.” “Irrational.” “A child.” (Various staff). And those who created the monster: “A moron” (Rupert Murdoch) “An idiot obviously.” (conservative Fox news correspondent Liz Trotta). And his “friends” when speaking privately to their own friends: “He’s not only crazy, he’s stupid.” (Investor Tom Barrack) I could go on. So, we now know what those whose careers and reputations are tied to his success, really think. If you are one of those people who think the Trump phenomenon still falls within the range of some kind of normalcy, consider whether words like this ever have been uttered about any other President by those closest to him.

2. Most of us imagined Trump buffered by people who, although perhaps ideologically extreme, were at least rational, informed, normally functioning humans. Instead, those in the West Wing closest to the man, those doing the manipulating and enabling, are themselves revealed in the book to be a terrifying bunch of squabbling misfits. Moreover, the crew that walked into the West Wing after the inauguration had almost no relevant experience in the business of government and no inclination to consult those who did. Bannon told Miller to go the Internet to look up how to draft an executive order. Katie Walsh, when she finally left her job as Deputy Chief of Staff, called it bitter rivalries joined to vast incompetence and an uncertain mission.

3. And what did Trump think about those around him? Bannon: disloyal and looks like shit. Priebus: weak and short, a midget. Spicer: stupid and looks terrible. Conway: a crybaby. Jared and Ivanka: a suck-up, never should have some to Washington. Ever and only the reality-TV man, looks mean everything to Trump. On the hiring for a senior national security position, Trump instructed: “That’s the guy I want, he’s got the look.”

4. What does Trump believe? The picture that emerges from those close to him is pretty clear: a man of many obsessions but no fixed views, and certainly nothing that can be characterized as conventionally ideological or political. Katie Walsh called them a set of vague beliefs and impulses, some of them contradictory. Converting these impulses into policy was, Walsh said, “like trying to figure out what a child wants.”

5. It is scary how completely journalists failed to understand what was happening during the first year. They diagnosed the problem as a White House that was “disorganized” or “dysfunctional.” That is like calling an airplane crew disorganized when the real problem is that no one in the cockpit knows how to fly and all are busy fighting with each other as the plane rumbles down the runway toward disaster. Apologies for mixing transportation metaphors, but the media missed the boat on how bad things were in the West Wing.

6. It is particularly painful to read how those closest to him before and during the campaign mislead the public. His business “friends” argued publicly that he was a brilliant businessman while observing to friends in private that he couldn’t read a balance sheet, had no appetite for details of any kind and was a terrible negotiator.

7. Some of the most frightening details concern his inability to process information. He doesn’t read. He doesn’t skim. “If it was print, it might as well not exist.” An email attributed to Gary Cohn (and summarizing the views of staff) reported “Trump won’t read anything – not one-page memos, not the brief policy papers; nothing. He gets up halfway through meetings with world leaders because he is bored.” Some staff members concluded he was only semi-literate or dyslexic. He mistrusts expertise and has faith only in his own intuition. He doesn’t listen, except to television, and then only selectively. And, if you don’t process information in the normal way, then you make it up. As Trump bragged, “I’ve made stuff up forever, and they always print it.” Is someone unable to absorb and process information “fit to discharge the duties of the office”?

8. The book is filled with testimony from both long time “friends” and those working with him during the campaign and first year in office, of his fundamental mental incapacity. They found that he was incapable of what doctors and neuroscientists call “executive function,” meaning the cognitive abilities to plan, organize, pay attention, focus, switch focus, exercise self-control or tailor his behavior toward the fulfillment of goals. “Executive function disorder” is a step beyond, and more crippling than, ADHD. The book paints the picture of a man “unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office” (in the words of the 25th Amendment). It starts with his inability to understand the Presidency as an institutional or political concept, as opposed to a media platform. The very idea of statesmanship is beyond him. When an important decision presents itself, such as our response to Syria’s use of chemical weapons, Kushner and McMaster both reported that he was more annoyed about having to make the effort to think about and deal with it, than he was by the attack itself. Staff report multiple moments of irrationality, “uncontrollable, vein-popping, ugly-face, tantrum stuff . . . primal.” He makes hugely consequential decisions (including the firing of James Comey) impulsively, without any process, consultation, or staff work. According to Steve Bannon, the debate within the staff is not about whether the situation is bad, but whether it is 25th amendment bad.

9. Lacking executive function, he is easy to manipulate. Imagine dealing with a man where nothing sticks. Where the decision depends on the last person in the room. Where everything is personal (amazingly, he views it as a “waste” to give a government job to someone he doesn’t know personally, which explains a great deal). If you are rich, a celebrity, or powerful, or you are sufficiently flattering and obsequious, then you can say or do no wrong. Until, that is, you disappoint him, in which case you are the subject of vituperative angry calumny.

10. If any single thing in this book should make you re-read the 25th amendment, it’s the image of him sitting alone in his locked bedroom in the early morning hours, three large screens replaying cable news, and the President of the United States making decisions by Tweet and publicly embracing whatever cock-eyed conspiracy story the provocateurs of the right are peddling that day. You wonder how he could possibly praise beyond-the-pale white supremacists or retweet anti-Muslim videos from British hate groups? Without knowledge, experience, and executive function there can be no judgment. It’s not that he has bad judgement, he has no judgement.

11. I won’t belabor my long-standing theme that it all comes back to his narcissistic personality disorder, but some of the anecdotes in Fire and Fury will go down in the annals of psychological history. When frantic staffers begged his “friends” to call him to get him to calm down and focus, “morning Joe” Scarborough advised him to figure out who in the West Wing he really trusted and sit down and talk things out before acting. “Who can talk you through this stuff before you decided to act on it?” he asked the President. “Well,” the President replied, “you won’t like the answer, but the answer is me. I talk to myself.” This should not be a surprise. During the campaign, when asked from whom he plans to take advice, he answered, from “myself, number one, because I have a very good brain and I’ve said a lot of things.” His narcissism is so all-consuming, that he regards all publicity as a zero-sun game – Roger Ailes explained, “If someone else gets on [the cover of Time], he doesn’t”.

12. We’ve long seen Bannon as a Svengali-like figure. But the book paints the picture of a man as twisted, damaged, and angry as Trump, but much brighter and thus more dangerous. If you breathed a sigh of relief when Roger Ailes died, think again. You think the bungled executive order on Muslim immigration, or the “two sides” comment were failures? Think again. Bannon’s strategy (perfectly aligned with Putin’s) is to drive the wedge between the American right and left ever deeper, until no reconciliation is possible. He wants nothing less than civil war resulting in total defeat of the left and destruction not only of the “administrative state” but the media, academic, and non-profit organizations that support it. As Wolf puts it, the overt racism, misogyny and daily outrages are designed to “shock the liberals so the [right-wing] base [is] doubly satisfied,” this is, both by the original outrage and by the liberal consternation it foments. Bannon’s plan: “the way to crush the liberals: make them crazy and drag them to the left.” Democrats, you’ve been warned.

13. So, here’s the question for the Vice President and the Cabinet: you all know about his disabilities and flaws and have observed that they have, on multiple occasions, rendered him unable to discharge his duties responsibly and effectively. Do you wait until one of those occasions involves war or other fundamental interests of the country, or do you do your duty now? And it is getting worse. His staffers worry that his speech has become even more rambling and repetitious and his ability to focus, even momentarily, has “notably declined.”

The people working in the West Wing are desperate, “I am in a constant state of shock and horror,” said one. Fire and Fury just cracks the lid on the pot, giving us an early glimpse. It will all come out in due time, because a man who cannot be loyal has no one loyal to him outside his own family. They all will spill their guts in return for six and seven figure advances, and, if we survive his tenure, future historians will have all they need to paint a vivid picture of American democracy’s most terrible failure.

]]>Repeal of the Johnson AmendmentFrederic RichWed, 13 Dec 2017 12:46:21 +0000https://fredericrich.com/blog/2017/12/13/repeal-of-the-johnson-amendment55a01411e4b0da93269f2e06:55de6692e4b0f73b86bffb96:5a311b7024a694311d4ad880Repeal of the Johnson Amendment, if included in the final tax legislation, may prove to be its single most consequential provision. This repeal, which its proponents formerly referred to as the “Houses of Worship Free Speech Restoration Act,” has been one of the top priorities of the theocratic right for almost two decades.

My 2013 dystopian political novel Christian Nation posited that only a few key pieces of Federal legislation would be necessary to move the country toward the theocracy so ardently desired by at least a quarter of our fellow citizens. Here is what I wrote in that story:

“Worst was the ‘Houses of Worship Freedom of Speech Restoration Act,’ which drove a stake through the principle that partisan political activity was not to be subsidized with a Federal tax deduction, but did so in a way that gave the benefit of the deduction to a single party. The evangelical and Pentecostal churches of America were, of course, overwhelmingly Republican, and the largest single part of the charitable sector. Although the Christian right had long been politically active, pastors were not allowed to endorse specific candidates or invest their charitable revenues in political advertising. Although there were many egregious violations of these rules, most clergymen obeyed because loss of the Federal tax deduction would have been devastating to the tithing and other contributions on which the movement relied. This would now change, with the $100 billion given to religious causes each year (about one-third of all annual charitable giving in America) suddenly available to support partisan politics. And ‘speech’ included paid advertising.”

Repeal of the Johnson Amendment is all about money and not at all about free speech. In a presidential election year total campaign (federal and state) spending is estimated to exceed $5 billion. And now, another hundred billion potentially entering the game, overwhelmingly available to one side only.

Consider who supports repeal. If it really does benefit non-profits generally by removing limits on free speech, then you would expect them to support it. They don’t. Charities and foundations overwhelmingly oppose it. The non-partisan National Council of Nonprofits explained, we “have worked for years, decades and centuries to build the public’s trust, and we don’t want to be dragged down by toxic partisanship.” The repeal’s sole proponents are politically active evangelicals. Doesn’t this alone tell you what you need to know?

In Christian Nation, the fictional memoirist, looking back from the theocratic future, speculates about the pivotal 2016 election, when a fictional demagogic theocratic populist defeated Hillary Clinton:

“[T]he ‘Houses of Worship Free Speech Restoration Act’ [repeal of the Johnson Amendment] had changed fundamentally the dynamics of American politics. The churches became the top sources – over PACs, corporations and individuals – of political advertising. Partisan endorsements from evangelical pulpits virtually guaranteed the votes of those congregations; there was little that any candidate could do to change the mind of a voter whose trusted pastor had informed him or her that one of the candidates was backed by God.”

There was a time when U.S. Senators dreamed that a moment of courageous principled integrity would earn them a place in history, like the eight senators who were the subjects of Kennedy and Sorensen’s Profiles in Courage. That moment is here. Fifty-one of you have the chance to change the course of American history and join the pantheon.

]]>Wednesday, December 6, 2017Frederic RichWed, 06 Dec 2017 15:50:41 +0000https://fredericrich.com/blog/2017/12/6/wednesday-december-6-201755a01411e4b0da93269f2e06:55de6692e4b0f73b86bffb96:5a280d398165f5ccfe7002beAnother day, the 392nd since November 9, 2016. A morning like so many others. The news is grim. The US will recognize Jerusalem and throw the Middle East into violent turmoil. Trump has endorsed Roy Moore, a crackpot theocrat twice expelled from the Alabama Supreme Court for ignoring Federal courts (and an alleged pedophile to boot). In an act without precedent, Trump disposes of 2 million acres of permanently protected public lands. It takes an effort to make my way through the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal. To my limbic brain it is like I am holding my hand over a flame; the neurons are begging me to pull back and walk away.

We are exhausted and discouraged. It’s an over-used word, but apt in this case: traumatized. And lethargy is one of the many perilous symptoms of trauma. It’s far too easy to allow moral indignation and anger to fade into a soothing malaise that excuses action.

With this in mind, I have forced myself back to my desk. We must not surrender to despair. We all must do what we can.

Trump First, American Last

Unless it threatens to drag us into war, the great American public tends to be uninterested in foreign affairs. It’s time to get interested. Domestic policy can be reversed. But Trump is well on the way to squandering the prestige, power, and moral authority built by this country over the course of the past century.

Trump has sought to personalize American foreign policy. He disdains the analysis of our intelligence and foreign policy professionals, refuses to consult or use our diplomats, and has replaced the entire apparatus of foreign relations with his personal impulses and illusions about his relationships with other leaders. And the result to date?

· Our European allies now treat us as a pariah state. Secretary of State Tillerson received a barely civil reception last week in Brussels. Even our “special relationship” with the UK is on the verge of collapse, thanks to the U.S. President's unthinkable endorsement of a pariah UK ultranationalistic hate group.

· The world chuckled in derision as Trump announced that the Middle East was “not so difficult as people thought” and dispatched Jared to make a deal. They’re not laughing any more. Every world leader, both parties, and every one of his predecessors understood why the US could not move its embassy to Jerusalem. So of course doing it was irresistible to Trump. Thousands will loose their lives in the ensuing violence, the cause of peace will be set back, perhaps by decades, and our friends in Europe will bear the brunt of invigorated terrorism. And for what? One man’s ego.

· By canceling the TransPacific trade deal (long championed by Republicans), pulling out of the Paris Agreement, risking millions of Asian lives by threatening North Korea with “fire and fury,” and kowtowing to China’s strongman (among many other sins of commission and omission), Trump has handed economic and political leadership of Asia to China. The first battle in China’s plan for global leadership, conceded by a blathering reality TV star without a shot fired.

· Republicans like to boast that Reagan won the cold war. They now need to wake up to the fact that Trump is reversing that victory. Even at the height of our enmity, the Soviet Union could not have dreamed of manipulating our democracy and installing a candidate guaranteed to weaken its enemy. Trump’s hero Putin achieved this, whether with or without Trump’s acquiescence or participation remains to be seen. But the result is clear enough. Putin has gotten his way in Syria and is pushing the US aside in its relations and influence in Turkey, Egypt, and elsewhere.

I could go on. I beg Republicans and conservatives to follow the lead of John McCain here. This is what he said in a speech on October 16:

“The international order we helped build from the ashes of world war, and that we defend to this day, has liberated more people from tyranny and poverty than ever before in history. This wondrous land has shared its treasures and ideals and shed the blood of its finest patriots to help make another, better world. And as we did so, we made our own civilization more just, freer, more accomplished and prosperous than the America that existed when I watched my father go off to war on December 7, 1941. To fear the world we have organized and led for three-quarters of a century, to abandon the ideals we have advanced around the globe, to refuse the obligations of international leadership and our duty to remain 'the last best hope of earth' for the sake of some half-baked, spurious nationalism cooked up by people who would rather find scapegoats than solve problems is as unpatriotic as an attachment to any other tired dogma of the past that Americans consigned to the ash heap of history.”

A Request

In today's coverage of Trump’s endorsement of Moore, neither the Times nor the Journal referred to anything about his background or qualifications other than the sexual abuse. This is also the case with most other media coverage. This is a disaster. A growing number of Americans have an issue with the fairness of destroying careers based on decades old sexual misconduct charges that have not been thoroughly investigated or proven. The real issue with Moore is that he is as unfit for high office as any candidate in recent history. Moore is a fringe fundamentalist theocrat who has twice ignored federal court orders on the basis that the Bible trumps the Constitution, and twice was expelled from his seat on the court. Until Bannon/Trump turned the world upside down (and before the allegations of sexual misconduct), he was treated as a pariah.

My request. Please complain to your favorite media sources if they omit the relevant facts about Moore. Please write on-line comments on news reports and postings that focus on the sexual allegations to the exclusion of all else.

A Happy Thought

The obsession of every person afflicted by narcissistic personality disorder is to create a world where “it’s all about me.” Donald Trump is the first to have succeeded, where the relevant world is not the bubble of family, workplace or community, but – literally – the world. Since November 9, 2016, has there been a newspaper anywhere in the world without Trump on its front page? A newscast in which the man’s face did not appear?

Narcissism is an addiction. The obsessive desire for attention and affirmation created by the addiction cannot be satisfied, because feeding those desires – as it does with all addictions – just stokes the fire and results in an unquenchable appetite for more.

Two classic symptoms common to all types of addiction are the impairment of what psychologists call “inhibitory control over behavior” and “attention deficit hyperactivity disorder” – that is, pathological impulsiveness, inability to focus, excessive activity, and inappropriate behavior; that is, Trump as he has been since childhood and will be until his death.

Here’s the happy thought. Giving the world’s most extreme narcissist the greatest amount of attention and power that a human being can have is like presenting the junkie with an unlimited life-time supply of heroin. There is only one way it can end: a spiraling descent to total self-destruction. The only question is the amount of damage he will do on the way down.

]]>The Path ForwardFrederic RichSun, 26 Nov 2017 14:22:46 +0000https://fredericrich.com/blog/2017/11/26/the-path-forward55a01411e4b0da93269f2e06:55de6692e4b0f73b86bffb96:5a1acae89140b7c3061c4548Sometimes the path forward is so obvious that we miss it in the search for more complex or subtle solutions.

We are still, however imperfectly, a democracy. Yes, Citizens United, gerrymandering, voter suppression, fake news, and hyperpartisan media silos all have undermined the foundations of our democracy. But it hasn’t crumbled yet, and voting remains the best means for effecting change.

So if you believe that Trump is unfit for office and/or abhor the agenda of the so-called “alt-right,” then – regardless of your ideological preference or traditional party affiliation – I suggest that your path is clear: you must vote in every election and you must tick the box for every candidate up and down the ballot, regardless of personality or party, who has the best chance of defeating the Republican. Let me be clear. This means that if your sister is running for dogcatcher on the GOP line, you pull the lever for her opponent. It’s not personal. The point is that as long as the GOP is the party of Trump and the alt-right, you should treat pulling the lever anywhere on the GOP line as a morally indefensible act.

The game plan of the Trumpist movement is clear: if a GOP politician fails to swear fealty to the strongman, she or he will be primaried from the alt-right and lose, and – unless things change – nearly half the time the winner of that GOP primary will continue to be the de facto winner of the general election (FairVote calculated last month this continues to be the case in 208 of 435 House seats). This could well lead to 16 years of Trumpism and the inevitable collapse of American prestige, leadership, and prosperity.

The only way to derail this result is to break through normal voting patterns and achieve a temporary but massive re-set of voter behavior. First, show up (the Trumpies will, that’s for sure). Second, the 72% of Americans who now self-identify as independent or Democrat, hopefully joined by millions of patriotic morally centered Republicans, must treat any candidate’s Republican Party affiliation as toxic for so long as the GOP is providing a home for Trump and the alt-right. It will take decisive defeats of GOP candidates up and down the ballot to persuade the party that Trumpism is not the horse to ride into the future. It will take multiple elections evidencing overwhelming repudiation of Trump and the alt-right in order to put the genie of populism back in the bottle.

It grieves me to have to advocate for a solution that is even superficially partisan, when excessive partisanship is part of what caused the present train wreck. I say “superficially partisan” because in intent and in the longer-term, what I advocate is not partisan at all. If you were a Republican before your party was high jacked by Steve Bannon, this is the only way to get your party back. Once the GOP escapes the unholy alliance between a narcissistic moron and a fringe movement with a repugnant agenda, then my many GOP friends can begin the important work of building a competitive center-right party for the 21st century. And they again can be free, if they wish, to vote Republican for the rest of their lives. But not now.

To those who choose to ignore the ugly side of Trumpism on the expectation that your profits will increase and your taxes decrease, I can only ask that you rehearse in your own minds the defense you will offer when discussing the matter with St. Peter at the gates to heaven.

]]>Roy MooreFrederic RichMon, 13 Nov 2017 13:10:26 +0000https://fredericrich.com/blog/2017/11/13/roy-moore55a01411e4b0da93269f2e06:55de6692e4b0f73b86bffb96:5a09970924a6942e8413eef3In my 2013 dystopian novel, Christian Nation, one of the first actions by the authoritarian populist who defeats Hillary Clinton in 2016 is to nominate Roy Moore to the Supreme Court. For many readers this was a step too far. Moore is one of the crankiest of the far-right fringe cranks; they found it unimaginable that he could be elevated to a position of national power and prominence in America in the 21st century. How times have changed.

Moore was, is, and always will be disqualified for high office by virtue of his record and beliefs. This truth has been largely ignored by the national media, which now has put all its anti-Moore eggs in the basket of 40-year-old sexual crime and/or misconduct.

Forgive me for quoting myself, but I re-read this morning what I had to say about Moore in Christian Nation, and want to share with you an excerpt:

“Roy Moore was one of the greatest heroes of the evangelical movement but was only vaguely known to the rest of the country . . . . Moore was a fundamentalist Christian of the more robust sort, having worked as a cowboy and kick-boxer, attributing his pugilistic successes to divine favor and intervention. As a state judge in Alabama, he displayed wooden Ten Commandments plaques in his courtrooms and opened his judicial sessions with prayers, sometimes calling on a clergyman to lead the jury members in conversation with God prior to the start of jury deliberations. . . . To drive home his fundamentalist belief that God was the sole legitimate source of law, and that all civil institutions must be subservient to God’s will, in 2001 he arranged for a five-thousand-pound granite monument to the Ten Commandments to be placed in the rotunda of the state courthouse. The federal courts ordered its removal, and Moore responded that the orders of the federal courts on such a matter had no legitimacy and that he obeyed only the orders of God and the great state of Alabama. The great state of Alabama responded by establishing a judicial commission that proceeded to remove him from office. . . . ‘Roy’s Rock’ then began is peripatetic travels in the American heartland, including appearances in thirty-one different states in one year alone. Moore became a folk hero to the Christian right, and in 2003 drafted the Constitution Restoration Act.”

For those who don’t remember, the “Constitution Restoration Act,” among other things, denied federal jurisdiction in any case where an official action is challenged because it is based on “acknowledgment of God as the sovereign source of law, liberty, or government.” In other words, it seeks to dismantle separation of church and state.

Subsequent to the publication of Christian Nation, Moore was re-elected to the Alabama Supreme Court, found guilty of the following, and again (permanently) suspended:

disregarding a federal injunction

demonstrating unwillingness to follow clear law

abuse of administrative authority

substituting his judgment for the judgment of the entire Alabama Supreme Court, including failure to abstain from public comment about a pending proceeding in his own court

interference with legal process and remedies in the United States District Court and/or Alabama Supreme Court related to proceedings in which Alabama probate judges were involved, and

failure to recuse himself from pending proceedings in the Alabama Supreme Court after making public comment and placing his impartiality into question.

Over the years Moore has navigated the far right fringe (what we now legitimize as the “alt-right”) espousing the view that President Obama is a Muslim foreigner (among a putrid stew of other conspiracy theories) and bizarre opinions on everything from preschool (a precursor to totalitarianism), evolution (“no such thing”), homosexuality (should be illegal), 9/11 (punishment by God for tolerance of gays and the rest of the liberal agenda), and Muslim representatives (should be barred from Congress).

U.S. senators are required to take an oath to “support and defend the constitution of the United States.” Moore, who has affirmed that he will not defend, or even obey, any part of the constitution or other laws that, in his view, conflicts with the word of God, cannot in good faith take the oath.

I fear that the exclusive focus on unproven long-past sexual crime and/or misconduct, which will strike some in Alabama as unfair, will backfire. Instead, we should focus on the person, his record, and his views. Like the President who now supports him, he is unfit for office, regardless of the truth of the recent allegations.

We face a freely-admitted, well-funded, brilliantly executed attempt to convert the Republican party into a Trump-centered alt-right populist movement that disregards the rule of law when it conflicts with its agenda. It is no surprise that Steve Bannon is so focused on this race. The election of Roy Moore could be a tipping point after which -- untethered from the norms of truth, reason, decency, or our traditional political culture -- we tumble precipitously into the abyss.

]]>KoreaFrederic C. RichBlogFrederic RichFri, 11 Aug 2017 15:53:10 +0000https://fredericrich.com/blog/2017/8/11/korea55a01411e4b0da93269f2e06:55de6692e4b0f73b86bffb96:598dd038bebafb146053a80dAmerica’s allies quickly discovered, as we did, that Trump the President is exactly the same as Trump the man: an untrustworthy ignorant braggart without the sophistication, knowledge or temperament to participate in matters of state.

The idea that any head of state would defer to his judgment as “leader of the free world” is laughable. And yet the country he leads, by virtue of the size of its economy, its traditional values and its military might, is the indispensable player in any world crisis. And there you have the conundrum faced by the world today, brought sharply into focus by the crisis with North Korea.

Imagine the nightmare being lived by the leaders of South Korea and Japan, whose populations face annihilation should Trump make an impetuous move. Imagine the nightmare of waking up to find the ally on which they have bet their existence, the most reliable of countries, the nation built on checks and balances, now led by a fickle buffoon whose capricious whims go unchecked by the institutions of government or established practices of our political culture. A man uninterested in the collective wisdom and experience of the tens of thousands of foreign policy professionals employed by his government. A man utterly convinced of his ability to manage the crisis single-handedly in the only way he knows: dangerous bluff and bluster unleashed via Twitter that escalates, as opposed to diffuses, the risk of conflict.

The crisis is of course a political gift to Trump. The instinct of the nation is to forget the niceties of the constitution and rally around the President when facing a significant threat from abroad.

But there is something greater at stake here. Over ten million people inhabit Seoul. Nine million people inhabit Tokyo. They must not be treated as pawns in a celebrity feud. History will never forgive the Secretaries of State and Defense if they don’t force the President to change course, or lose their jobs in the attempt. If Congress stands by without asserting its authority, it will create a stain on our democracy that can never be erased.

]]>IllegitimateBlogFrederic C. RichFrederic RichTue, 06 Jun 2017 13:07:34 +0000https://fredericrich.com/blog/2017/6/6/illegitimate55a01411e4b0da93269f2e06:55de6692e4b0f73b86bffb96:5936a75d725e258c00ec1268Illegitimacy is defined as “the state of not being in accordance with accepted standards or rules; lack of authorization by the law.” We have crossed some kind of line when serious people on the right start down the path of questioning the “regularity” and “legal soundness” of Trump’s presidency.

Jack Goldsmith is a conservative lawyer and scholar. A fellow of the Hoover Institution and Professor at Harvard Law School, he served as a senior official in the Justice Department under President George W. Bush. A serious man and a leading conservative voice.

In an extraordinary eruption of 17 Tweets yesterday, he wrote “Trump’s actions since January, and especially in [the] last month, take us so far beyond normal that it’s hard to have any faith in [the] Executive Branch.” He argued that the President’s personal actions have undermined the deference that our political culture says we owe to the Presidency and the Executive Branch. “The impulsive, uncontrolled, ill-informed President infects the legal soundless of everything his administration does. As best I can tell, no President’s actions have ever so adversely affected trust in his administration, including Nixon during Watergate.” So we now have a presidency that has deviated so far from accepted standards and rules that it does not deserve even the simple presumption of regularity and legal soundness. In other words, a presidency that has squandered its legitimacy.

This is an extraordinarily consequential analysis. Goldsmith argues that the incessant lying, the manifest instability, the firing of Comey, the intemperate attacks on judges, legal process, long-standing allies, the intelligence services and the press exonerate us from having to afford the office the normal presumption of “regularity.” We – the people, the Congress, the courts, even the lawyers charged with representing him and Executive Branch employees who work for him ­– no longer need to presume that any of his words or actions are taken in good faith or constitute the regular lawful exercise of Executive Branch authority.

As a result, Goldsmith writes, Executive Branch officials find themselves in a nearly impossible position. Is it morally or legally acceptable to defend Presidential prerogative when the President has proven he cannot wield it responsibly? How far can they go before resignation is their only option?

With Goldsmith’s analysis, we are starting to get a clearer picture of the slowly emerging constitutional crisis. This type of illegitimacy is not anticipated by the constitution. It is not simply incompetence; it is willful incompetence. It is not simply mis-government, it is the systematic undermining of government. It is a profound corruption, where the corrupt spoils are not so much in material gain as in the satisfaction of the ego; where the interests of the nation are traded for the indulgence of the man’s momentary impulse, narcissistic self-image and lust for attention. It is a pervasive and corrosive bad faith, where the crime is not just convenient mendacity, but a willful disdain for expertise and even objective truth. It is disinterest in details. It is disdain for advice. It is failing to take the business of governing seriously. It is a perpetually raised middle finger aimed at our political culture and traditions. At our friends and allies. At the very idea that relations with others can be anything other than a zero-sum transaction. At a world order painstakingly built over generations. It is “the state of not being in accordance with accepted standards or rules.” It is illegitimate.

Trump is no longer a president in any conventional sense. His tweets and words deserve no more respect than the blather of a reality TV star or the ignorant ranting of a crank. He is viewed as ridiculous by virtually all the rest of the world and by the majority of Americans. In that respect he is no longer a president. He may be the president under law, but he is not a president.

Nothing in our constitution or political culture suggests how to deal with this. Nixon resigned because his confrères in the party told him it was over. Even if today’s Republicans had the same wisdom and courage, he would mostly likely refuse to go. He will hole up and lash out. We must prepare for the constitutional crisis that will follow.

]]>June 1, 2017BlogFrederic C. RichChristian NationPoliticsEnvironmentFrederic RichThu, 01 Jun 2017 22:34:52 +0000https://fredericrich.com/blog/2017/6/1/june-1-201755a01411e4b0da93269f2e06:55de6692e4b0f73b86bffb96:59309576a5790aea041616a4In my book Christian Nation, the fictional narrator writes, “They said what they would do, and we did not believe them. Then they did what they said they would do.”

Trump told us what he believed about climate change and told us what he would do about the Paris Agreement. And now he has done it.

Ironically for a man who purports to be dedicated to the restoration of America’s prestige and power, he has at a stroke squandered much of the moral authority and prestige built up over the past century. America may be “first” in his alternative universe, but in the real world we now inhabit an exclusive club of climate non-participants with Syria and Nicaragua.

Mr. Putin’s authoritarianism, supported mainly by fossil fuel sales, is now assured. China will pivot cynically but effectively into a climate leadership role, assuring that its workers, and not the disgruntled Americans who handed Trump the Presidency, have the millions of 21st century jobs in green energy.

Earth is of course the biggest loser here. But close behind is American democracy. In polling after the election, 69% of voters said they supported remaining in the Paris Agreement. This included a majority of voters in every state. And even among voters who voted for Trump, only 28% said they favored withdrawal.

Post-enlightenment civilization has been based on reason and science. Today my country repudiated both. I often wondered what it felt like on August 24, 410, when Rome fell to the Visigoths. Now I know.